


Song of Songs

by Thimblerig



Series: Love And Other Disasters [4]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: F/M, Idiots in Love, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 07:48:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18245501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thimblerig/pseuds/Thimblerig
Summary: One of d’Artagnan’s sooty eyebrows quirked up. “Unlucky in love? You?”“On the contrary, my dear d’Artagnan, I amawashwith it.”





	Song of Songs

**Author's Note:**

> Set between 1.02 and 1.03.
> 
> Aramis quotes the Song of Solomon and astute readers may get a bonus.

“Do you have any good rhymes for ‘silver’, d’Artagnan?”

Aramis stooped over a table in the mess-hall, papers spread out in disarray like fallen soldiers after a battle, his nimble hands stained with dark ink, and all of him lit golden in the low light of two candles.

D’Artagnan frowned. “‘Kill her’?” he hazarded.

“Hm, perhaps not.” Aramis blinked befuddled, ran an ink-stained hand through ruffled hair, and flashed him a brief smile. “Actually ‘silver’ was three poems ago. I’m on a sestina with words of only one syllable now. Ah. Hm. Let me think -”

“Have you been up all night?”

“I am composing,” said the marksman with dignity, “for a lady who has _standards.”_

“Ahh…”

Aramis cocked one eye. “You?”

 

_“Oh you,” Constance said, and put her warm hand on his cheek, and her eyes were very kind, and all the scent of the flowers rose up around them._

_“They’ll go so wonderfully in our living room,” she’d added, taking the bouquet and stepping back into the house, oblivious to the words caught in d’Artagnan’s throat._

_“What’s that, dear?” he heard from the depths of the dwelling._

_“Oh, just some flowers, Bonacieux, the first of the spring, aren’t they a treat?_

_D’Artagnan stepped back himself, turning so he did not have to see the back of her head. And he walked for hours on the streets of the city, past the tolling hand-bell of a nightwatchman and the raucous eddies of late revellers, before realising, with misery, that he had forgotten his latchkey._

_He wasn’t going to wake either of them up, not tonight, to get into their locked chambers._

_He’d rather die._

 

 

“How do you do it?” d’Artagnan blurted, ignoring the question. And Constance's marriage. “How do you actually _woo_ someone? So that it works?”

Aramis frowned, thoughtful. “I’ve found listening is helpful. And being their friend. Because then, you have a friend.”

“And?”

“Make them laugh, if you can. Fetch rouge for them in the market, if they like rouge. The bloody hearts of their enemies if that appeals… Make your interest clear but not oppressive, and then…”

“And then?” asked d’Artagnan, peat-brown eyes wide and fascinated.

“And then nothing. They remain oblivious to all wiles, flirtations, and blandishments. Your heart, ill-nourished, dies and dies again, starved on the thin meat of indifference.”

“Hey now.”

“Oh, Constance loves _you,_ never doubt it. Have patience, that’s all.” Aramis ran a quick hand again through his hair.

One of d’Artagnan’s sooty eyebrows quirked up. “Unlucky in love? You?”

“On the contrary, my dear d’Artagnan, I am _awash_ with it.”

An early bird sang, bell-bright in the dimness, slipping silver through the low crackle of the mess-hall fire and the erratic scratch of Aramis’ pen. D’Artagnan tipped his head back in his chair and drowsed.

 _“Who is this who comes like the dawn?”_ Aramis said softly, and startled the Gascon upright. _“Bright as the sun? Fair as the moon?”_

D’Artagnan squinted. “Is that your poem? I’m sure she’ll… love it,” he said uncertainly.

“It’s from the Bible.” Aramis set his face in po-faced piety but his eyes twinkled. From outside the mess-hall d’Artagnan finally heard the footsteps, light but definite. The door creaked open.

Athos stood in the doorway, hair dripping and his eyes bleary and adorned with the bags of a hangover, but his uniform crisp and natty. Cool, green (bloodshot) eyes dipped to the ink-scrawled pages and crinkled at the edges, disapproving.

“It’s only love poetry, brother,” Aramis said brightly.

“If you’re quite done with breakfast - and the other - gentlemen, we have a parade route to secure,” Athos said dryly.

“I’ll get the horses,” d’Artagnan muttered, scrambling to his feet.

Athos frowned. “Did you get _any_ sleep last night?” he inquired.

 _“Terrible as an army with banners,”_ Aramis added under his breath as he rose smoothly. Athos raised one mild, terrible eyebrow, and Aramis set one hand on his heart, tipping his lieutenant a bow before strapping on his sword-belt and pauldron, and shouldering the leather baldric that held his long arquebus.

Athos glanced again at the papers. “Madame de Chagny?” he asked, voice cool. “Or the Duchess de Longueville?”

“Michon,” Aramis answered, folding them daintily and ignoring Athos’ restrained twitch.  
  
“How can you -” Athos broke off. “So lightly,” he added, bewildered. And, “Don’t tell me they mean nothing.”

“I can always love a friend,” answered Aramis, softly smiling.

Athos looked at him bewildered. (His head ached, no doubt.) Aramis’s smile widened. A drop of water slid lazily from Athos’ hair to plop on his leather-clad shoulder. Aramis stepped in smoothly and brushed it away with a deft finger. “Always,” he murmured, and let his hand linger.

Athos stared at him blankly. Then, “We need to move.”

Aramis laughed, soft and rueful.

He dropped his hand to Athos’s pauldron, resting his palm over the seal of the fleur-de-lis on his arm, and squeezed as if to leave his own mark. “Come on, my friend.”

Together they stepped into the morning.

**Author's Note:**

> Written to two prompts by Anathema Device:
> 
> "Aramis writes poetry to a person he admires. Athos tries not to be jealous."
> 
> and
> 
> "Aramis teaches D’Artagnan about wooing. Is really talking about Athos."


End file.
